As a survivor of the Oscar wars of 2010, British director Tom Hooper should have known to have barricades at the ready when he entered the awards season this time with Les Misérables.

Back then, many film critics thought David Fincher's incisive Facebook exposé, The Social Network, deserved best picture over Hooper's poignant biopic The King's Speech, for which he also received best director.

Now, he has riled the scribbling class with an even more overtly emotional entertainment, an opera-style musical that often causes serial bouts of prolonged weeping. Some pundits exchanged gloating tweets when Oscar voters decided to overlook Hooper in the directing category for Les Mis, even though it is still up for eight awards, including best picture.

This time, the battle is personal. Not only have Hooper's casting decisions come under fire — mainly, Russell Crowe's bear-growl attempts to sing the part of Inspector Javert. But also setting off a minefield of attacks is the filmmaker's desire to deconstruct the way stage musicals are adapted for the big screen and make it a more intimate experience with a variety of devices — extensive close-ups, handheld camerawork, tilted angles, wide lenses, odd framing and distracting backdrops.

An amusingly ambitious attempt at a takedown lurks at Movie Mezzanine. Writer Corey Atad, who duly notes with irony that Les Mis is in the running for an award from the American Society of Cinematographers, does a photo essay of what classic movies such as Citizen Kane, Vertigo and Casablanca would look like if Hooper got his mitts on them.

That people are even talking about Les Mis nowadays is a bit of a miracle for a 150-year-old tale. But it is only fair that Hooper himself has a chance to address his critics.

Q: What do you think of writers, such as The New Yorker's David Denby, who consider your film of Les Mis as a kind of disease?

A: Ultimately, I'm confused by it. I put my faith and trust in the audience. I definitely make films for them, just like The King's Speech. The greatest reward is sitting in the audience and hearing the reaction at the end. The way the movie is performing, it does seem like Denby's reaction is a marginal response. Ten percent of every single person in Korea has seen it. In London, there have been newspaper reports of legions of people witnessing open displays of emotion, the extent of which no one has ever seen before. The time we live in is a postmodern age where a certain amount of irony is expected. This film is made without irony. A friend of mine who lost his father in October said the film's ending made him feel better about his dad, that he felt closer to him. (It's) as if the musical holds up a mirror to the suffering in our lives.

Q: Even reviewers who liked the film thought all the close-ups of the actors felt a little overdone. Did you ever consider cutting back?

A: The close-ups were an option. We shot each scene in more than one way. We were never tied to using close-ups over and over. But each time we used them, it felt more emotional. It allowed the character to be in the center of each scene and not flinch from them as they went on a journey of discovery with the audience. We made a cut with fewer close-ups and then switched it up. (The sequence with the song) I Dreamed a Dream had more of a medium shot tracking slowly to a close-up. That song went to a whole new level. People assume you don't think these things through. I spend my life thinking through every eventuality.

Q: There has been much debate over Crowe's vocals. Even Sacha Baron Cohen (who plays the corrupt innkeeper Monsieur Thénardier) made a disparaging joke at the Golden Globes. Crowe has sung with a rock band and did musical theater when he started his career in Australia. Was his singing a concern for you?

A: We auditioned hundreds of hundreds of people — opera singers, musical actors, film actors, actors who couldn't sing or could sing. The truth is, you need people who can hold a movie camera. To find brilliant film actors who are brilliant singers — there are so few choices. I ultimately stand by what Russell did. I love him in the film. I embraced a kind of raw attitude to the vocals that is unusual in the modern age. I tried Auto-Tune, composites of different takes. But I ended up using only the original live take. Otherwise, there was a loss of realism, integrity and emotional vulnerability.

Q: What did you think when your name was missing among the Oscar-nominated directors?

A: It's a year of wonderful movies. You can't really expect any particular result to happen. The Golden Globes win for best musical was a huge thrill. And the Directors Guild nomination personally matters so much because it comes from my peers. I love that event — they turn the nomination into an award itself, with less emphasis on the winner.